[NYTr] AT ime for Decisions: Must-Read for Those Who Think There's No Criticism in Cuba

[All the News That Doesn't Fit]

[This is the latest of a whole series of articles published by Juventud
Rebelde over the past year at least, regarding inefficiency,
corruption, consumer fraud by businesses, shoddy quality, etc. as well
as the material they published on the "Gray 5 Years" -- which was highly
critical of the sort of cultural censorship that existed in previous
times in Cuba, and which expressed loud and vigorous dissent to a
broadcast that seemed approving of the people responsible, much less
any return to it.

While Cubans have always complained about such problems among
themselves, many have been reluctant, as is often the case in families
all over the world, to "air the dirty linen in public."  But these
Rebelde articles (in English, no less) have been pointed, honest, and
pulled no punches. They clearly indicate that Cubans are feeling
stronger and less vulnerable to the monster in the north. -NYTr]

Juventud Rebelde - Oct 27, 2007
http://www.juventudrebelde.co.cu/columnists/2007-10-27/a-time-for-decisions/

A Time for Decisions

By Luis Sexto

The anecdote that I’m about to tell possesses the undertones of a
parable, but it’s a true story. Recently, a customer at a certain
vegetable stand asked if there were cabbages in better condition that
those on display. The plants were dried up, shrunken and marked with
black spots. One of the clerks that was cleaning the floor told her
co-worker to go find a better one in the stockroom. Bothered with the
request, the worker replied, “I know when I have to bring them out.
First we have to sell those on display.”

Is this or is this not a parable of life in Cuba? It doesn’t matter
that the merchandise is in bad condition, it must be sold – despite
only deserving to be used for swill. Certainly, this fact isn’t
anything new. This concept of “quality” abounds in business here:
disrespecting the customer in both treatment or in the offer of goods.
We’ve spoken about this before, so I’m probably repeating the same
complaints I’ve made over the last several weeks and months.

I’m telling this little story because I plan to use it to fashion a
parable: that’s to say, to extract a certain truth from the anecdote,
an instructive concept. It’s evident that some people in our society
have to learn how to respect people.

Notice the contradiction. There are some institutions here that are
actively engaged in promoting education and others that fight to
protect the health of citizens. Yet, there are other sectors in which
we treat people with such indifference. What for, why?

I’m not going to get tangled up looking for shortcuts to say how much I
worry about our present and future. We have to learn to look honestly
at problems.

I began speaking about farmers markets, and I ask myself: don’t they
notice that the products are lacking? Has it escaped their attention
that now we are confronting more problems as to what to buy? At first
sight, we see fewer products. Recently I visited certain place on the
island, and the only things that I saw in the shops were avocados. Good
god, will we have to live on avocados? As any man or woman in the
street would say, you shouldn’t exaggerate.

I believe that the best goods are being hoarded away in the
“storerooms.” It seems that the agriculture needs to be revamped
organizationally – and quickly. This must be done in a way that
promotes the earth while meeting the food needs of the country.

This means, lastly -- as the moral of my tale about cabbages and
commercial backwardness -- that keeping goods in the storerooms, that is
to say, taking too much time to put them in the marketplace for sale,
particularly fragile ones, implies a danger. They risk ruining these
commodities under the effects of weather, insects and whatever. When
the goods are put out for sale, they are as rotten as the bad as the
ones they’re supposed to replace. In personal, social, or political
life, fruit -- like a decision -- has one requirement: it has to arrive
on time.